What Presents Are For
by asebi
Summary: Lily needs to know what she got for Christmas. And a New Year extra.
1. What Presents Are For

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry potter. It belongs to JK Rowling. I make no money from this.

.x.x.

A little girl no more than six crept as quietly as she could up to the large, magically-decorated Christmas tree. Her goal: the presents—especially that large one…

Almost there…almost…al—

"Lily Luna Potter!"

Lily jumped. She spun around and faced her mother, a woman more terrifying, she felt, than any dragon Uncle Charlie faced at work.

"Mum!"

"I hope you're not trying to sneak a peek at those presents again," she said, hands akimbo.

"No. I was looking at the Christmas tree," Lily smiled innocently at her mother.

Ginny narrowed her eyes at her youngest child; she was too mischievous for her own good. "Honey, you'll just have to wait for tomorrow like everyone else. You don't see your brothers trying to peek, do you?"

Lily stomped her foot. "But I want to see what I got _now_! I can't wait another day!"

Ginny sighed. She bent over and picked up her daughter.

"You're getting too heavy for this," Ginny sighed as Lily wrapped her scrawny arms around her and hugged her close. Ginny smiled into her hair. It was somewhat reassuring feeling those arms around her, comforting.

"Why don't you help me in the kitchen?" she said. She could just imagine the way Lily was probably pouting at her.

Lily wasn't pouting though; she was too busy making wild gestures at Al and Jamie hiding behind the big couch. This was their opportunity to look.

As they entered the kitchen, Ginny set Lily down, a bit relieved.

"Alright, here you go…" Soon she wouldn't even be able to pick her up anymore.

Lily stared up at her mother and pouted.

"I don't want to help you in the kitchen; there's nothing to help you with," she said.

"Oh, come now. There must be something you could do…" Ginny said, looking around the kitchen.

Lily's eyes followed her mother's. They both looked at the bag of groceries on the counter. Lily didn't need to see in the bag to know what was in there.

"It's boring in the kitchen when you cook. All you do is wave your wand—"

"Oh, hush you! Just sit over there," Ginny said, pulling out a chair, "Here, have a snack."

Lily stared at the biscuits that appeared on the counter. She climbed up onto the chair that was just a little too tall for her and started eating as she watched her mum prepare dinner. It wasn't much, nothing at all like what Grandmummy did. She liked watching Grandmum in the kitchen; it was like a ballet. All the food would dance around, knives slicing here, dicing there, and they would all just collect themselves neatly where they belonged. Mum in the kitchen, however, wasn't very exciting. Mum would just point her wand at the premade, prepackaged food and they'd be done. All Mum had to do now was stick it in the oven. It just didn't make for much entertainment.

Lily polished off the last biscuit and scooted off the chair.

"I'm gonna go find Al and Jamie," she said before leaving.

Her brothers weren't hard to find; they were sitting upstairs in the den.

"Did you get it? What did we get this year?" Lily asked.

"Well…" Al said nervously.

"…we didn't get to look;" James said flatly, "Dad came in just as we were about to."

Lily frowned at her big brother, scrunching up her face she did so.

"It's not like we could have gotten to it anyway. Didn't you see that circle they drew around the tree?"

Lily flopped down next to Al, sighing. Big brothers were so useless sometimes.

.x.x.

Lily's light footsteps padded down the stairs and over to the Christmas tree. It was barely dawn and there wasn't anyone else up yet. She wasn't supposed to fall asleep last night, but Mum and Dad came in to read her a story and she couldn't keep her eyes open.

Another few steps…

Mission success! She plopped down next to the big present box with her name on it and began tearing off the colorful wrapping paper with the bewitched skating snowmen. She watched as some of them skated away from the giant rip that appeared on the paper, waving their twiggy arms up at her in anger. She giggled.

"Lils! You were supposed to wake us!"

Lily turned and stuck her tongue out at her two brothers.

"We agreed that the one to wake first had to wake everyone else!" James continued.

Al, feeling that Jamie was going to take a while, moved around his brother and joined Lily under the tree.

"Here, Al, this one's yours," Lily said, shoving a box at him before resuming her own present-opening, ignoring Jamie.

Jamie gave up and sighed. "Slytherins," he mumbled under his breath before joining them.

Al looked up surprised but Lily just giggled.

Between them three, they had unwrapped nearly everything by the time Ginny and Harry came in. There was Chocolate Frogs from Uncle Ron, a Potion set for Lily from Aunt Hermione, some joke products from Uncle Bill, among other things.

"Dad! Look at this!" Al shouted when he saw Harry come in, waving around the Beater's club from the (prototype) Children's Quidditch set Uncle George sent, meant to allow children to play Quidditch without the dangers of a real Bludger or trickiness of a real Snitch. It was to be the latest product line at the Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes.

"You can try it out later when we go over to the Burrow," Harry told him.

Ginny looked under the tree and frowned.

"Look. It seems you've missed a few," she said.

Al glanced guiltily at the neatly wrapped gifts, but didn't say anything.

"We…we decided we've gotten enough for Christmas," James said.

"Oh?"

"Y-yeah…" he glanced over at his siblings for help.

"You've always said we should think about the people who aren't as lucky. So we decided to give these to them," Lily said

"Right…" Ginny said, "but aren't these from Uncle Percy?"

"M-maybe," Lily said.

"Don't you think he'll be sad if you showed up at the Burrow not wearing them?"

"But…!" James and Lily said together. Al glanced at the gifts and slowly, reluctantly, picked out the one meant for him. Both James and Lily just watched him at first, but soon gave in.

They picked at the Spell-O-Tape.

"I can't get the Tape off; I can't open it this year," Lily said hopefully, looking up at her parents.

"Here, I'll help you," Harry said. He waved his wand and the wrapping undid itself on all three gifts.

The children groaned.

Ginny picked up a slip of paper that fell out from Lily's gift.

_Be sure to wear them when you go play in the snow. – Uncle Percy_

"How considerate of him," Ginny said, chuckling as her children pulled out oddly shaped knitting from the box.

"It's amazing that after all these years, Percy's Knitted Abominations haven't improved at all," Harry whispered to Ginny.

"They wouldn't be Abominations if they improved, now would they?"

Thank goodness they had convinced Percy to stop giving them any. Both laughed at the identical miserable looks on their children's face.


	2. Honey, I Lost the Kids

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter and make no money from this.

.x.x.

Lily struggled against the confines of the sparkly dress her mother had stuffed her into.

"Is it always so itchy?" she grumbled to Rosie. This was the first year Lily had been allowed to go to the fancy New Year Dinner Party Dad was forced to go to. She'd been super excited about it. Al and Rosie had gone to their first one last year, and Jamie the year before that. This year, it was hers and Hugo's turn.

"It's itchier when you wiggle like that," Rose told her.

Lily pouted at her older cousin.

"This isn't very fun," Lily grumbled.

"No one said it would be."

Lily continued to fidget. She didn't like sitting still like this. There was too much fun to be had and not enough time to have them.

"Why is Daddy talking for so long?" she complained.

"He gave a very short speech last year and everyone made a fuss. In the end they made him go up again," Rose said.

She tried to listen to the words her father spoke, but they were too boring. She just couldn't sit still anymore! Lily grabbed Rosie's hand and pulled her to her feet.

"Let's go find something fun to do!"

She dropped to her knees, pulling Rose down with her, and began to crawl away from the tables. She thought she'd seen a large fountain outside and some funny looking white peacocks.

"Where are you guys going?" someone whispered. Lily looked up at the faces of Jamie, Al, and Hugo.

"To play outside," Lily whispered back.

"Outside? We're not supposed to go outside!" Hugo said.

"Loosen up, Hugo. That sounds like a brilliant idea. Just like my little sister!" James said, beaming, before dragging Al and Hugo down to the ground with them.

It was chilly outside, but Lily didn't care; it was much better than being inside at the party any ol' day.

"Now what?" Rose asked, "It's too cold to do anything out here."

"Hey! What are you doing outside?" someone called.

All five of them turned to see a boy with pale hair and even paler skin. He had pointy features that made him look mean to Lily.

"We haven't decided yet," Lily said, "You wanna play with us?"

"It's too cold to play outside," the boy said, "and the peacocks aren't very friendly. They bite."

"Peacocks can't bite people," Rose said.

"These peacocks can. They bit Uncle Blaise the other day when he tried to pet them."

"What'll we do now?" Al asked.

"Hey, where else can we play then?" Lily asked the boy.

"Do you want to come up here and play with me?"

They looked at each other. James shrugged and turned to the boy, "Sure. How do we get up there?"

"Hold on! I'll come get you!"

.x.x.

"Ron?" Hermione called, "Ron! Where are the kids?"

"Kids?" Ron slurred in his drunken state.

"Yes, kids. _Our_ kids."

"I dunno, weren't they with you?" Ron tipped the wine glass he was holding, nearly spilling the champagne in the cup. Hermione caught it just in time. She glared at Harry, who was standing next to his best friend.

"You shouldn't have let him drink so much, Harry!" But Harry just shrugged.

"Lighten up, Hermione. He's just having a bit of fun."

"Well, you aren't the one who has to deal with his hangover tomorrow, are you?" she huffed. She glanced at Harry. Harry held a glass, too, but it wasn't of liquor. "Is that water? Why aren't you drinking?"

"Me? Oh, I've had enough for the night. That hangover from Christmas was horrible and Ginny refused to give me any Hangover Potion," he winced at the memory.

"Bloody hell, mate, that sucks!" Ron said.

Hermione narrowed her eyes at him as he brought his glass up for another drink. "Stop drinking already, Ron! You've had enough. Maybe I should follow your sister's example," she told her husband darkly.

Ron wasn't listening, though; he'd turned back to Harry and was continuing on about George's progress on his new product: Percy's Knitted Abominations™. He'd gotten to the point where the knitting needle he bewitched now churned out lopsided knits, but one could still recognize what they were if one looked.

"He hasn't told Percy yet, but he's sure it'll be a hit," Ron was saying.

"Don't worry too much about the kids, Hermione. I'm sure they're fine. Rose and Hugo are both very sensible," Harry told her.

"I wouldn't be worrying so much if they were the only ones gone; your kids can't be found either," Hermione said.

"WHAT!" Harry shouted. Everyone turned to stare at him, but he didn't care, "Why didn't you say so earlier? Who knows what kind of trouble they're getting into now?"

He turned this way and that hoping to catch a glimpse of either his wife or his youngest child. It was no doubt Lily's fault.

"Potter!"

"Not now, Malfoy! I can't find my kids!"

"Potter, they're here!" Draco said impatiently.

"I said—what?" Harry looked at him dumbly.

"Upstairs. They fell asleep in Scorpius's room. Come." Draco turned and, not bothering to check if either Harry or Hermione was following, led them down a corridor and up a flight of stairs. The Manor was a lot different now than it was when Voldemort occupied it. Frankly, Harry liked what Draco has done to the place.

"Here," Draco said, opening the door.

Inside, Harry saw Lily, Albus, James, Rose, and Hugo all curled up on the giant rug in front of a small fireplace. There was another boy next to them, also asleep, presumably Scorpius Malfoy. He sure looked like Draco did as a child. Someone had thrown a large blanket over them to keep them warm.

Harry and Hermione both sighed in relief.

"Remind me next year, Hermione, not to bring Lily."


End file.
